(AUDUBON, JOHN JAMES, after)
The Great Blue Heron, [Plate CCXI, no. 43], from The Birds of America, engraving with etching, aquatint, and hand-coloring, a working proof aside from the published edition, before the engraved lettering and plate and issue numbers, printed on the reverse of an uncolored impression of the Rusty Grackle, Plate VLCII, no. 32, on J. Whatman paper, watermark 1834. Full sheet, with several repairs in the edges and a small filled hole in the blank area lower right. The proof shows different coloring from the final palette, specifically in the body, which is more blue than grey, the feathers, which are highlighted in green, and the thigh and bend of the wing is russet rather than orange. Framed and matted.
39 x 26 1/2 inches.

Property from a Private Midwest Collection
Provenance:
Sotheby's, New York, January 27, 1983, Lot 79